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RAVAGE'S AL EXPECTS PLENTY OF ENERGY AND HOOKS TO KEEP YOU BELIEVING!

Metal titans RAVAGE have made the recent release of re-recording their first debut album "Return Of The Spectral Rider", with current plans on working upon a bunch of material that's just been lying around, may be made into a double album soon enough. Frontman vocalist Al Ravage discloses the album's details, style, and how their band's name came about.

1. Please tell us about the history of your band and its members.

I (Al Ravage) and the singer. My brother (Eli Firicano) and I formed the band and we played our first show in 1996. We've had many line-up changes since then, but we've kept at things through various successes and failures and periods of lots of activity and lots of inactivity. Guitarist Nick Izzo joined around 2001, we signed to Karthago Records in 2005, then Metal Blade Records in 2009. Now we are fully independent. We've played in Europe a couple of times, played all around the USA. We just like putting out metal music and playing whatever shows we are invited to play.

2. What’s the origin of the band’s name?

When I was a (13 year old) kid, I wanted to start a heavy metal band and I was looking for a cool name and I thought "Ravage" was the perfect name for a heavy metal band. This was back in the early 90's when you couldn't just search for anything online. So I went to the local record stores and searched through the racks for any albums by a band called Ravage. I was surprised not to find any so I assumed there never was one and started using the name. Even though it became apparent a few years later that there had been bands called Ravage, the fans wouldn't let us change it and after the first 20 years passed it seemed pointless to change it...

3. Where is the band based out of and what is your music scene like there? Are there any local bands you could recommend?

We are from the Boston Massachusetts area of the USA. We have a good, very diverse local metal scene with too many bands to name. There are classic bands that are still around like Meliah Rage. Newer bands that are becoming well-known in the national scene like Revocation, Power Glove, Lich King etc and plenty of good new and emerging bands like Seax, Sonic Pulse, Reckless Force, Dreaded Silence, Seven Spires, Black Mass, Goblet, Ice Giant etc... too many to name.

4. How would you describe your style?

We are a mix of traditional heavy metal and new wave of british heavy metal style stuff like Iron Maiden, Saxon, 70's Judas Priest with late 80's style trash influences a la Testament and early Metallica and then there is some late 90's euro style powermetal influence as well. We kind of run the gamut of anything that'd be considered traditional heavy metal and thrash.

5. What have you released so far and what can someone expect from your works?

We've released a couple of albums. Our most recent release was a re-recording of our first album called "Return Of The Spectral Rider". We have some videos on Youtube for our songs "Grapes Of Wrath", "Turn The Screw" and our cover of Judas Priest's "Nightcrawler". From us I would always expect plenty of energy and plenty of melodic hooks and keeping true to what we believe in. Basically, we try not to be boring...

6. Do you have any new music in the works?

We are working on a bunch of songs we've had lying around forever. We hope to record a double-album soon.

7. How about playing shows and touring, have anything planned out?

At this point we are working on recording and videos. We will be headed to Germany next summer for the Headbangers Open Air Festival and we hope to be able to put some shows together around that. We are looking for help with that.

8. What plans do you have for the future as a band?

We want to get our best music recorded, play some good shows and just have as much fun as we can doing what we want to do.